TAVES 2016: Angel City Audio

The Angel City Audio room was a pleasant surprise, and one of my favorite sounding rooms in all of TAVES. Angel City Audio is a distributor based in California, under their umbrella are brand names such as Melody, NuForce, and their own line of speakers also called Angel City Audio (ACA).

Nr. Nhan Hoang, owner of PhenomeNhan AV, came all the way from Texas to exhibit at TAVES, and he gave me a detailed run down of the equipment being shown.

TAVES 2016 coverage sponsored by VPI

Initially I had mistaken the speakers to be Joseph Audio’s Perspective which carries similar resemblances. They are actually Angel City Audio’s own Seraphim Prime speaker, in a Cocobolo High Gloss finish (US$ 22,000). The rest of the system consists of a Melody P2688 Pre-Amp (US$ 7,299), Melody M845 Monoblock Amplifiers ( US$ 6,899), Onix OCD-103CD/Media Player (US$ 19,000), a Triangle Art Signature Turntable (US$ 30,000), and a ModWright PH150 Phono Stage (US$ 7,900).

I listened to multiple songs from Anne Bisson and Vincent Belanger’s latest album “Conversations”, the sound was inviting, natural and organic. There were no hard edges or sibilance to speak of in the high frequencies and the mids were well-integrated into the bass, without any unnatural booms or exaggerations.

I have never owned any of the individual pieces of equipment so I cannot comment on whether the sound can be attributed to a particular piece, but the system as a whole simply sounded natural and musical, a superb job. Well done !